elections
scientificactivist | March 17, 2007Not that HIV/AIDS is an important issue or anything... but it appears that Republican presidential hopeful John McCain hasn't been thinking much--or at all--about HIV prevention. The New York Times blog The Caucus reports that when asked about the subject at a recent campaign rally in Iowa, McCain looked completely stumped:
Did he support the distribution of taxpayer-subsidized condoms in Africa to fight the transmission of H.I.V.?
What followed was a long series of awkward pauses, glances up to the ceiling and the image of one of Mr. McCain's aides, standing off to the back, urgently…
scientificactivist | March 14, 2007While most of the candidates vying for the Republican presidential nomination have been in a race to see who can most shamelessly pander to the Religious Right, Rudy Giuliani has more or less remained above the fray. So far, this strategy has paid off surprisingly well, as recent polls have indicated.
Even more surprisingly, though, comes the today's revelation by Roll Call (subscription required) that Giuliani may pick up the endorsement of one of the dirtiest conservative organizations out there, the Club for Growth:
Club for Growth President Pat Toomey said the group's leaders are still…
scientificactivist | March 11, 2007I've been openly skeptical of the shift to the right that we've seen lately by those vying for the Republican nomination for the presidency. Although my skepticism is targeted more at the inevitable swing to the center that their rhetoric will surely take after the primaries (despite the continued influence that the right wing voters courted now will continue to have if one of them is elected president), it's only fair to address the obvious question: should we be as skeptical of those on the Democratic side? Although we have not seen as stark a shift in the front runners on the Democratic…
scientificactivist | November 11, 2006Four days after the Democrats' impressive Election Day victory, the commentary keeps streaming in, almost to the point of overkill. Today's Guardian, though, ran a particularly poignant piece from Martin Kettle:
Every poll for months had signalled a serious Republican defeat. Reporting from America in May, I was told that no Republican strategist believed they could hold the House of Representatives. As David Broder, the dean of American political reporters, wrote this week: "Never was a political wipeout better advertised in advance than the one that hit the Republican party on Tuesday."…
scientificactivist | November 10, 2006Chris of Mixing Memory points us toward a good comparison of the Democratic victory in 2006 to the Republican victory in 1994. In short, the comparison--located at a Columbia statistics blog, Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science--shows that the Democrats won a greater percentage of the total vote in 2006 (56%) than the Republicans won in 1994 (51.6%). The Democrats were shortchanged, in a sense, because the number of seats they won does not truly reflect their impressive lead in total votes. In light of this, although the Republican victory in 1994 was incredibly…
scientificactivist | November 10, 2006With the election results almost completely finalized, it's time to reflect on what they mean. Make no mistake about it, Tuesday demonstrated a true mandate for the Democrats. The Democrats achieved a majority in both the Senate and the House, picking up 6 seats and 29 seats, respectively. The Democrats did not lose any seats in either house. In total votes, the Democrats had a 13.4% advantage over the Republicans in Senate races and 5.6% advantage in House races (this shows that, in the Senate in particular, the 2 seat advantage that the Democrats hold hardly does them justice). The main…
scientificactivist | November 9, 2006It's official now. Republican candidate for the Virginia Senatorial seat, George Allen, has conceded the election, making Democrat Jim Webb the official winner. This means that the Democratic takeover of both the House and Senate is now complete and official.
Although Allen would have been entitled to a recount, since the final results put him and Webb within 1% of each other, it was clear that there was no chance of reversing Webb's 9,007 vote lead. At the time of this post, Webb currently has 1,174,906 votes (49.59%) and Allen has 1,165,899 (49.32%). See updated results here.
scientificactivist | November 8, 2006(I think that I'm done updating this post for now, as the results show no indication of changing significantly. I'll have more to say about the election tomorrow.)
A Democratic majority in the Senate is all but certain, as Montana and Virginia both appear to have gone to the Democrats. This means that the Democrats were able to live up to the high expectations, successfully gaining control of both the House and the Senate.
With 100% of precincts reporting, Democrat Jon Tester has beat out Republican Conrad Burns in the Montana Senatorial race. The count (as of 5:30 pm ET) is 198,302 (49.07…
scientificactivist | November 7, 2006As I wake up this morning, I see that things have changed slightly, and I probably should have been even more optimistic last night. The Democrats and Republicans both have control of 49 seats each, and Democrats need to win the remaining two races in Virginia and Montana to gain control of the Senate. Although the results are still coming in, Democrats have an advantage of 1,170,564 to 1,162,717 in Virginia (99% of precincts reporting) and 158,068 to 153,453 in Montana (87% of precincts reporting). A Democratic takeover of both houses of Congress suddenly looks a lot more realistic.
See…
scientificactivist | November 7, 2006Some quick election updates:
The Democrats take the House, and they stand to pick up a few extra seats in the process. The senate is still uncertain. If the Democrats win three out of four key races, they could still pull it out, but it isn't looking too hopeful.
Rick Santorum is history. Enough said.
South Dakota voted down a proposed ban on all abortions.
Of the three Texas races mentioned here previously, Democrats Chet Edwards (US Congress) and Patrick Rose (Texas House of Representatives) held on to their seats, but, unfortunately, so did Rick Perry (Texas Governor).
Overall, things…
scientificactivist | November 7, 2006Here's some election news from back home in Texas--specifically, from the district where my mother lives, just south of Austin, Texas. From the Burnt Orange Report:
This just in from Hays County.
Former Republican [State] Rep. Rick Green who was taken down by Patrick Rose in 2002, apparently got a little upset over a Rose mailer that had his face superimposed on this year's Republican nominee Jim Neuhaus (as Green is deeply involved in running the Neuhaus campaign).
So upset that Rick Green drove up to the polling location that Patrick Rose was at a punched him in the face, catching him off…
scientificactivist | November 7, 2006There is so much to say about the importance of today's election, but not a great deal that hasn't already been spelled out time and time again. Most importantly, if you haven't already voted, go vote today! Hopefully you'll have time to research the individual races and find out where the candidates stand on the important issues, particularly those related to science. Either way, though, if you are concerned and disheartened with the direction our nation has taken lately, and if you want to ease the suffering that U.S. science has been forced to endure, you'll probably be voting…
scientificactivist | November 6, 2006This won't be news to anyone from Texas, but our governor, Republican Rick Perry, is a walking disaster. From The Dallas Morning News:
SAN ANTONIO - Gov. Rick Perry, after a God and country sermon attended by dozens of political candidates Sunday, said that he agreed with the minister that non-Christians will be condemned to hell....
"If you live your life and don't confess your sins to God almighty through the authority of Christ and his blood, I'm going to say this very plainly, you're going straight to hell with a nonstop ticket," Mr. Hagee said during a service interspersed with…
scientificactivist | November 6, 2006If George Bush is driving our nation down a one-way road to hell, it's the Republican-controlled House and Senate that are enabling him to do this. On October 17th, Bush signed into law the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which had previously passed the Senate and House on the 28th and 29th of September, respectively. This is another dangerous piece of legislation from the Bush Administration, one that should leave us all slightly disturbed and give us something else to think about on election day. Current Yale Law student and former Oxford student (and India travel buddy) Cyrus Habib…